Watch Xander Bogaerts, Alex Cora both earn fiery ejection after suspect strike-3 call

Xander Bogaerts rarely loses his cool but the Red Sox star and manager Alex Cora both got the hook against the Orioles after a bogus strike-3 call. 

Boston Red Sox manager Alex Cora is no stranger to getting ejected. Whenever he sees a call from an umpire he disagrees with, he has zero qualms about voicing his displeasure. That, however, is not often the case with the normally mild-mannered Xander Bogaerts.

So on Friday night in Baltimore for the first game of a series against the Orioles, we saw a side of Bogaerts that rarely comes to the forefront.

In the top of the fourth inning with a runner on base and two strikes in the count, Bogaerts took the 2-2 pitch that looked low to the naked eye. However, the umpire did not see it that way and wrung up the Red Sox shortstop.

Immediately furious, Bogaerts chucked his bat to the side in anger before immediately getting into the ump’s face. He was promptly given the hook before Cora could come to defend him. But don’t worry, the shortstop soon earned a clubhouse buddy as the Red Sox manager was ejected soon after.

Red Sox: Xander Bogaerts, Cora both earn heated ejections vs. Orioles on bad call

The video is pretty indicative that the ump made a bad call on strike three, but the MLB game tracker also confirmed as much as the pitch was very clearly below the zone (and actually looked even more so in real time).

To see Bogaerts reacting like that, though, you have to imagine that it’s a season’s worth of frustrations boiling over. Boston entered Friday’s contest a game below .500 after an inexplicable blowout loss to the Pirates on Thursday night. And with that, their playoff chances are dwindling more and more by the day.

So to get a bad call that ends the inning? That was too much for him to take. But now the Red Sox, who were trailing 6-4 at the time of the ejections, will have to try and spark a comeback without one of their most reliable bats and leaders in the lineup.

Not great, Bob.